Since excavation of materials from the earth's surface, or subjacent to the earth's surface, has been occurring, the need to refine the excavated material has existed. In particular, the excavated material is often comprised of various compositions, such as rock, sand, pebbles, mineral deposits, and other contaminants or otherwise undesirable compositions. In such instances, the desired material, e.g., sand and pebbles of reduced diameter, are often required to be separated from larger diameter contaminants that may be contained within the excavated material.
Depending upon the application, separation of the larger diameter contaminants from the desired material may be accomplished through the use of a number of various aggregate separation devices. Vibratory feeders, for example, utilize conveyor belts that are configured to: accept raw material input at one end of the conveyor belt; transport the raw material to the other end of the conveyor belt; vibrate the conveyor belt during transport to mechanically expel unwanted material; and deposit the refined material at the opposite end of the conveyor belt. Other conveyor based feeders may utilize electromagnetic means to separate ferrous materials from non-ferrous materials.
Due to the sheer size and weight of these prior art aggregate separators, however, transportability becomes an almost prohibitive constraint to their use at job sites whose locations are constantly changing. Fixed location quarries, on the other hand, may utilize these prior art aggregate separators effectively, since once the prior art aggregate separators are installed at the quarry, transportability is no longer an issue.
Other job sites requiring excavation and back filling operations, such as construction job sites, however, pose transportability issues in regard to prior art aggregate separators. For example, the size and weight of conveyor based aggregate separators nearly preclude their transport via towable trailers, especially to construction sites having limited access. In addition, should the conveyor based aggregate separators find their way to a particular construction job site, their mere presence may hinder other construction activities that may be occurring at the job site, simply due to the amount of area required to operate the conveyor based aggregate separators.
Efforts continue, therefore, to improve the methods and apparatus that may be used for aggregate separation. In particular, advancements are desired to develop aggregate separators that are more conducive to transportability. In addition, once at the job site, such a transportable aggregate separation device must occupy as little space as possible, so as to avoid disruption of other activities that may be occurring.